Whatever hope Tyrann Mathieu had of returning to LSU may have gone up in smoke Thursday.
The former star player known as the Honey Badger, a Heisman Trophy finalist last year, was one of four former LSU football players, including quarterback Jordan Jefferson, who was arrested on marijuana-related charges in Baton Rouge.
Mathieu,
who was kicked off the team in August for multiple failed drug tests,
spent four weeks in a Houston drug rehabilitation
center run by former NBA star John Lucas, and is enrolled at LSU
this fall with hopes that the school might somehow reconsider
his permanent suspension.
Mathieu,
20, and Jefferson, 22, were charged with simple possession of marijuana
while Karnell Hatcher, 22, was charged with
second offense simple possession of marijuana, and Derrick Bryant,
22, was charged with possession with intent to distribute
marijuana.
They were booked into the East Baton Rouge Parish Prison.
All four were on last year’s 13-1 national runner-up team, but only Mathieu had eligibility remaining.
Jefferson was suspended most of his senior season as the result of his arrest stemming from a fight at Shady’s, a Baton Rouge
night club, on Aug. 19, 2011. He has
been on the Montreal Alouettes’ practice squad of the Canadian Football
League since being released by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers.
He’s in Baton Rouge to finish his degree.
According to The Associated Press, Lance Unglesby, Jefferson’s lawyer in the misdemeanor criminal case, said a discovery hearing
in that matter is scheduled next week. Jefferson has maintained his innocence in the bar fight.
Unglesby said he had not yet been provided any details of Jefferson’s latest arrest, but stressed, “All individuals are presumed
innocent and I look forward to the opportunity to examine the facts of this case to find out what really happened.”
The
incident, according to a Baton Rouge Police Department report, began at
approximately 3:30 p.m. Thursday, when officers
were dispatched to Mathieu’s apartment complex in response to
reports that Jefferson was trying to force his way through the
complex’s security gate.
According to the report, Jefferson had a confrontation with a maintenance worker at the complex gate before being let in by
a resident.
When
police arrived, the maintenance worker pointed to Mathieu’s apartment,
indicating which apartment Jefferson went in.
Police knocked on the door and Mathieu answered. Police entered
the apartment to talk to Jefferson. Upon entering they said
they “smelled a strong odor of marijuana” and asked permission to
search the apartment, which Mathieu granted.
Police
found all four former players in the apartment and also found a
marijuana grinder, a digital scale and 10 bags of high-grade
marijuana.
Seven of the bags were found inside Bryant’s book sack.